Men Have ‘Good Hair’ Issues, Too

I’ve only seen the trailer. But when Chris Rock’s new documentary Good Hair hits select theaters today, I imagine those in the dark will walk out laughing, and with (hopefully) a better understanding of the complex relationship between a black woman and her hair.But what about a man’s hair dilemmas? Finding a good barber. The rigorous upkeep. The limited selection of hairstyles we can choose from—depending on profession. Not to mention the stigmas attached to styles we do end up choosing—Rock should make a sequel to Good Hair. Call it Good Hair For Men, Too.

Let’s start with the barber dilemma. Finding a barber we can trust is harder than finding a soul mate. Trust me, I know.

With a stew of Puerto Rican, black and Japanese bloodlines running through my veins— my hair was always a thick, jet black, part-curly-part-nappy mass of confusion for barbers. In my hometown of Seaside, Calif., there were only two barbershops—the racially ambiguous Supercuts chain, and Hair Company, an old-school, black-owned-and-operated barbershop. I went to neither. I cut my own hair—a No. 2 razor on the clippers, all the way around. Coincidentally, I also wore hats all the time.

When I left home to attend HowardUniversity, I took my haircut way more seriously. Not only were there a slew of barbershops where I could get my hair cut in Washington, D.C., but also a handful of classmates who “put it on mom” that for $10 they could “hook me up” with a “tight” cut. There were also a lot of girls. So I had to have it together.

Across the street from Howard’s campus were two black-owned/operated barbershops—Best Cuts and Joe’s. Finding a good barber at either of these locales was the easy part. The difficult part was maintaining a relationship with them. For the first two years, every barber I dug was gone by the time I came back to school after summer or winter break.

But during my junior year, I found “Larry,” (not his real name and you’ll see why in the next sentence) a soft-spoken Jamaican whose chair was located in the back of Best Cuts. In addition to cutting hair, he also ran a lucrative bootleg business—selling CDs, white tees and movies still-in-theaters.

After graduating, I moved to New York City and like for many men who move, finding a good barber was at the top of my to-do list. But unlike the two-yearlong search I underwent in D.C., my search in New York was settled in the matter of a week, thanks to a co-worker who suggested I go to the world-famous Astor Place Hair Designers near New YorkUniversity’s campus. It’s not the traditional black-owned barbershop I had in D.C., but Morales, the barber recommended to me, is so precise I’ve remained a loyal customer for the past five years. But on my first to visit Morales, he and I had to make sure we spoke the same barbershop jargon.

As Chris Rock explained when he appeared on Oprah last week, a perm for black women means the opposite of what it means for white women. (For sisters, getting a perm is to straighten their hair; for white women, to curl it.) The terms black men use to talk about various hair “services” is not determined by race, but by region.

Although I currently have a faux-hawk, my usual haircut is what people generally call a low-top fade—a short crop of hair on top with less hair blended in on the sides and back—but in order for it to look the same no matter where I go, I have to make sure my barber and I are speaking the same language. In Washington, D.C., I ask for a “taper;” in New York, a Caesar. In Seaside, where I now go to Hair Company, I ask for a fade.The same haircut, I ask for it three different ways.

Once we’ve found a good barber, and we’ve translated terms for one another, there’s the issue of our barber’s schedule.

Ever since the 2002 film Barbershop, people want to believe that all men like to hang out in them. But in real life, only old men and young children enjoy spending their time at the barbershop. Men like me, who are between say, 18 and 34, are usually impatiently watchingESPN—or, in this age of Obama, MSNBC and CNN—while we wait. And why is there always a wait? Because, for reasons never revealed to us, our barber doesn’t take appointments. And even though I’m usually entertained by hearing older men talk trash at Hair Company; even though I mix it up with other heads-in-waiting at Best Cuts about which rapper is better, Jay-Z or Nas (I say Jay); and though I enjoy sneaking a glance at the women who walk into Astor Place Hair Designers, it all gets old after about an hour of waiting. All I really want to do is get my hair cut and leave. Thing is, I and most men I know put up with our barber’s schedule because we’re just as vain as women.

Whether we have a job, or are currently between gigs, whether we have a date that night or no date, men are willing to wait as long as it takes to get a fresh haircut. Not only does a new haircut make us feel like a new man, it’s the most affordable style upgrade we can get. I go to the barbershop once a week, every week. Regardless.

What’s funny though is that in all the years I’ve spent in barbershops, there never seems to be a myriad of styles being cut. Like a lot of my friends who work in corporate America, I tend to stick with a conservative haircut, even though as a writer, and as someone who has worked in the liberal(ish) world of magazine publishing, I can, and on occasion do, exercise a little creativity. A few friends of mine have done the same, sporting locks, or the Michael Jordan baldy—but for the most part, the Caesar is to black men in corporate America what the flat top is to men in the military—standard issue.

Getting something like the mullet Kanye West rocked at this year’s presidential inauguration is asking for public ridicule, not just by outsiders, but by our own. Even style-savvy Jay-Z was given the Internet’s own special brand of the third-degree for growing out his hair while working on his latest album, The Blueprint 3—so much so, that he addressed the criticisms on “What We Talkin’ About:” “Check out my hair/ These ain’t curls/ These is peas/ Peasy head still get paid/ I’m combing through Gs/ Please…” I’ve never worn locks or braids, but I know men who have, and they all have at least one story about the prejudices they’ve experienced on account of their chosen looks.

As Chris Rock points out from the very beginning of the film, Good Hair was inspired by his daughter’s questions about her hair, so naturally the documentary is going to have a woman’s focus. But if Chris Rock had a son, or took the time to think about the evolution of his own hair (he now rocks, what else? A Caesar), he just might realize men’s hair tells stories, too.

Jozen Cummings is the former articles editor at VIBE/Vibe.com. The Howard alum is also a former KING staffer. Jozen writes about his love life (such as it is) at Until I Get Married.